IIT-M professors to speak to engineering aspirants

Four sessions to be hosted online starting 6 p.m. today

Some senior professors at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras will speak about engineering streams to aspirants graduating from Class 12. The professors aim to help the aspirants identify a discipline best aligned with their interest.

The sessions will be hosted live on https://nptel.ac.in at 6 p.m. starting Monday till Thursday. The programme begins with V. Kamakoti of the department of Computer Science. On Tuesday G.K. Suraishkumar of the Biotechnology department will speak on bio engineering and biosciences. S. Aniruddhan of Electrical Engineering will speak on Wednesday and on Thursday. Civil Engineering professors Manu Santhanam and Ravindra Gettu too will take part.

Online courses

The July-December edition of the National Programme on Technology Enhanced Learning (NPTEL) has on offer 400 online courses. Students can register through onlinecourses.nptel.ac.in .

The courses provide 20% credit transfer and are free and open. Those interested in receiving a certificate must take an examination for which fee is charged.

Andrew Thangaraj, coordinator, NPTEL-IIT Madras, said, “NPTEL currently works with more than 3,800 colleges, including those offering engineering, arts, commerce, science and management courses. Universities and autonomous colleges that want to take advantage of credit transfer must implement the credit transfer policy in their institutions.”

NPTEL is part of the Central government’s Swayam initiative. The All-India Council for Technical Education (AICTE) guidelines allow universities and colleges to permit up to 20% credit transfer in every semester through Swayam.

NPTEL is a joint initiative of IITs and IISc, and is offered through Massive Online Open Course format, where learners must watch videos online, submit assignments on a weekly/monthly basis and register for a proctored final exam.

Students can request for transfer of credit once they clear the certification examination, as approved by the regulations of the affiliated institute. Till date NPTEL, which is coordinated by IIT Madras, has received more than one crore enrolments.